43-4 External Characters of Ruminant Artiodactyla. 



Subfamily Oheotsagixs. 

 Genua Oreotragus, H. Sra. 



Oreotragus oreotragus, Zimm. 



In 1910 the only material of this species available for 

 examination was a single toot with the bones of the pastern 

 cut array from behind. A fresh specimen that has since 

 come into my hands has shown that my description of the 

 foot was wrong in one important point. I am now able to 

 correct this, and to add some particulars about other glands. 



The preorbital gland was visible externally as a small 

 shallow pouch with a circular orifice opening in the centre of 

 a sparsely hairy area of skin a little way in front of the ante- 

 rior angle of the eye. The gland itself consisted of a thick 

 solid mass of black tissue, the secretion of which, smelling 

 like the perfume of Viverra, was discharged through four 

 large pores opening at the bottom of the shallow pouch. 



The published evidence as to the existence of inguinal 

 glands in this antelope is contradictory, Hamilton Smith 

 affirming, Owen denying, their presence. There was no trace 

 of them in the specimen I examined. There were two pairs 

 of mamma?. 



A peculiarity of the klipspringer is its habit of standing 

 upon the truncated ends ot the hoofs, and not upon the s< le 

 and heel of the foot like all other Ruminants, whatever the 

 nature of the ground they inhabit. The interdigital space 

 above the hoofs is tolerably long and deep and lined with long 

 hair, but is not apparently glandular. In longitudinal 

 section it is nearly rectangular in shape, the heel-tie being 

 short and formed of a close fold of skin which is eveivwhere 

 covered with long hair and neither thickened nor upturned at 

 its distal or lower extremity. 1 he fore and hind feet are 

 alike in structure (fig. B). 



The rhinarium or muffle is naked above as far back as a 

 line joining the posterior extremities of the nostrils. On the 

 sides of the upper lip the hairs extend up to the interior edge 

 of the nostrils and forwards towards the middle line, nar- 

 rowing the lower part of the rhinarium almost as in Ourebia 

 and Sotutragus (fig. D). 



The status of the subfamily Oreotraginse is not, in my 

 opinion, affected by the corrected information we now possess 

 of the structure of the interdigital spaces. 



